-The Indian Express The state has failed to create capacities for a timely, reliable, decentralised data regime. The credibility of India’s data systems is under serious threat with the recent controversy over the employment data of the National Sample Survey. While the Census of India and the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) have a good reputation, when it comes to data related to the social sector — health, education, nutrition —...

-Working Paper No. 74, Nabakrushna Choudhury Centre for Development Studies, Bhubaneswar In this paper, we revisit the well-known debate on the inverse relationship between farm-size and agricultural productivity. Using unit level data from Situation Assessment Survey (SAS) of Agricultural Households in the 70th Round National Sample Survey (NSS), we test the relationship between yield (output per hectare) and land operated as well as the relationship between net returns per hectare and...

-The Hindu Business Line It scores over loan waivers as it benefits all farmers and gives them more control over the cultivation and sale of their produce There is an illusion across various quarters that a one-time farm loan waiver can remove all the hardships farmers have been going through over the last 15 years or so. This illusion has been occupying more space in public discourse in recent months because of...

-News18.com Acclaimed journalist and Founder-Editor of the People’s Archive of Rural India, P Sainath attributes the existential crisis confronting India’s agrarian society to macro-economic policies set in motion 25 years ago. Talking to Anuradha SenGupta, Sainath makes a case for state intervention in agriculture and says the Modi government, with its shifting positions and policies like demonetisation has only aggravated the assault on agrarian livelihoods. Dismissing the buzz about imminent new initiatives...

-The Hindu In addition to reforming the credit system, agriculture should be made profitable Rural agrarian distress is firmly at the centre of the national discourse today, triggered by the recent Assembly election results in the Hindi heartland as well as continuous farmer agitations in the past two years (picture). Just a month ago, the farmers’ march in Delhi highlighted the reality of their deprivation, anger and resolve. Quite remarkably, their presence...